At the end of each retreat, participants provide anonymous feedback to the organizers. Here are some unedited excerpts about the 2009 International Gnostic Retreat hosted at Padmasambhava Buddhist Center in New York.

Comments about the overall experience

• Overall great- felt the energy of the exercises very open and laid back
• A very good experience with a diverse and interesting groups
• Excellent - very conducive to meditating
• Great overall - the experience was extremely helpful, especially the days of silence, we talk too much. It has shown me much about Gnosis and other students
• I can't really put it into words but it was completely wonderful
• Fantastic! Thank you so much
• Great
• It was one of the best experiences I had and the most challenging with the silence rule in play
• Awesome
• Really great! Beautiful place and all was well.
• Good and deep
• Inspiring as usual
• Great friends and insightful
• Experience was invaluable for learning how the various practices are actually done
• It was really nice to be around people who are on the spiritual path like myself and to see the diversity I loved the calmness of this place and being around simplicity.
• Wonderful, it was a priceless and unforgetable experience
• The retreat was very helpful in resolidifying my practice.
• Very good
• Difficult
• It was wonderful
• It was a great experience to be in such a great place for the retreat. I learned and reinsured the basics of meditation also from the lectures I got hints as to how to approach people of my religion.
• It has been a very heavy retreat for me, mainly because of my previous work. The atmosphere was better for work than the previous one, therefore I could work a lot and I'm happy I could
• Yay
• Excellent

About the lectures

• To me the lectures are always amazing and it was particularly important for me to witness how they actually come through, how they materialize spontaneously.
• Of all your 200+ lectures, including the ones here. I have yet to find one I don’t like.  I listen and gratfeully thank you.
• Yes I liked them, maybe a small information session at the beginning for new practitioners. I noticed a lot of those that only have internet resources had many questions
• Lectures were good. Q&A was great - varying locations might help with impression absorption
• Yes, dream yoga would be a good lecture topic
• Good talks - suggestion Kabbalah healing
• The lectures were great especially the differences between the lecturers - keep it up
• The lectures were great; my suggestion is to offer lectures about how to live socially, how to interact with other people.
• Excellent
• The lectures were great, however I would like to see at least one more session for lectures.
• Excellent lectures
• The lectures were very good
• They were priceless and spoke right from the heart
• How to incorporate a retreat observation and lifestyle into an everyday life. Just before the first meal an explanation of how to use the mantra krim, to chew your food 30 times, to be mindful of the meals and even telling or performing the pancatattwa ritual will help people be more conscious in everyday life
• Lectures were good well centered around the main topic of the retreat
• Yes- all were excellent
• Yes they were good
• Yes especially the nutrition lecture which makes a lot of since to me. I like to see integrative exercises where we have to work together - topics on 2012 aquarian age and beyond, our work with other traditions on the same path synergy.
• Lectures were great, no suggestions
• A place with less insects so we can focus on the lectures

Suggestions for future retreats

• I think a longer retreat - a week long would be better and also the silenced days hopefully more than half should be observed carefully by all,  perhaps a very detailed explanation of what silenced days involve prior to our arrival might be helpful. Also would be nice to finish earlier like 9pm and start at 6am
• I think having 2 days of silence was excessive, reason being because in this modern world people want to get to know each other, also we learn more with interaction (so please limit silence to 1 day)
• The mixture of instructors was wonderful and helpful. My only difficulty was the [vegetarian] food
• I think you should be recording every single thing that any instructor for any practice says. I think a lot of valuable stuff gets lost. There was so much here it may be difficult to remember everything. Recordings could be a helpful refresher.
• I understand the helpful aspects the 2 day silence may produce. However as for myself talking with other gnostics was also a big thing for me as it’s the first time I'm actually communicating with other people about this, so I would probably have preferred this to be an individual choice.
• Maybe a longer women's session - I didn’t get much of an opportunity to know other women because most are in couples and theres so many men.
• I found that it wasn’t until Sat. that I was finally able to relax in meditation, this was in part due to not being able to find a good posture also because the practices are so broad and intense for a beginner I found I had to stick to the OM mantra with much prayer. trying to follow an instructor was sometimes distracting especially if my heart wasn't in the  practice. Basically I need to pick one practice to focus on, and trying to find a comfortable position in a room full of meditators is unacceptable. A dorm living area that practices quieter silence would be nice.
• Having time to observe the mind is great.
• Longer retreat; more in store
• This was the most powerful retreat thus far
• l feel that the retreat should be at least 2 weeks long. Include tasks to work on and to be challenged within the group; there is a certain level of group co-exercises that needs to be improved upon as a whole.
• Comparing it to the last retreat this time we had more space and so people were further apart from each other.
• Longer;` I really liked having all instructors participating in presentations.
• The retreat should stay the same length, for I feel as though the longer the retreat, the quicker the time will pass. Please explain the conjurations and invocations particularly the conjurations of the 4 and 7 and invocation of Solomon in depth. thank you
• Did not like the silence
• Not in August when traveling is the most expensive time
• A longer retreat